I see one there who is.
If you have any courage or noble quality in you, go out and speak to them, man to man.'
He turned and looked at her while she spoke.
A dark cloud came over his face while he listened.
He set his teeth as he heard her words.
'I will go.
Perhaps I may ask you to accompany me downstairs, and bar the door behind me; my mother and sister will need that protection.'
'Oh!
Mr. Thornton!
I do not know—I may be wrong—only—'
But he was gone; he was downstairs in the hall; he had unbarred the front door; all she could do, was to follow him quickly, and fasten it behind him, and clamber up the stairs again with a sick heart and a dizzy head.
Again she took her place by the farthest window.
He was on the steps below; she saw that by the direction of a thousand angry eyes; but she could neither see nor hear any-thing save the savage satisfaction of the rolling angry murmur.
She threw the window wide open.
Many in the crowd were mere boys; cruel and thoughtless,—cruel because they were thoughtless; some were men, gaunt as wolves, and mad for prey.
She knew how it was; they were like Boucher, with starving children at home—relying on ultimate success in their efforts to get higher wages, and enraged beyond measure at discovering that Irishmen were to be brought in to rob their little ones of bread.
Margaret knew it all; she read it in Boucher's face, forlornly desperate and livid with rage.
If Mr. Thornton would but say something to them—let them hear his voice only—it seemed as if it would be better than this wild beating and raging against the stony silence that vouchsafed them no word, even of anger or reproach.
But perhaps he was speaking now; there was a momentary hush of their noise, inarticulate as that of a troop of animals.
She tore her bonnet off; and bent forwards to hear.
She could only see; for if Mr. Thornton had indeed made the attempt to speak, the momentary instinct to listen to him was past and gone, and the people were raging worse than ever.
He stood with his arms folded; still as a statue; his face pale with repressed excitement.
They were trying to intimidate him—to make him flinch; each was urging the other on to some immediate act of personal violence.
Margaret felt intuitively, that in an instant all would be uproar; the first touch would cause an explosion, in which, among such hundreds of infuriated men and reckless boys, even Mr. Thornton's life would be unsafe,—that in another instant the stormy passions would have passed their bounds, and swept away all barriers of reason, or apprehension of consequence.
Even while she looked, she saw lads in the back-ground stooping to take off their heavy wooden clogs—the readiest missile they could find; she saw it was the spark to the gunpowder, and, with a cry, which no one heard, she rushed out of the room, down stairs,—she had lifted the great iron bar of the door with an imperious force—had thrown the door open wide—and was there, in face of that angry sea of men, her eyes smiting them with flaming arrows of reproach.
The clogs were arrested in the hands that held them—the countenances, so fell not a moment before, now looked irresolute, and as if asking what this meant.
For she stood between them and their enemy.
She could not speak, but held out her arms towards them till she could recover breath.
'Oh, do not use violence!
He is one man, and you are many; but her words died away, for there was no tone in her voice; it was but a hoarse whisper.
Mr. Thornton stood a little on one side; he had moved away from behind her, as if jealous of anything that should come between him and danger.
'Go!' said she, once more (and now her voice was like a cry).
'The soldiers are sent for—are coming.
Go peaceably.
Go away.
You shall have relief from your complaints, whatever they are.'
'Shall them Irish blackguards be packed back again?' asked one from out the crowd, with fierce threatening in his voice.
'Never, for your bidding!' exclaimed Mr. Thornton.
And instantly the storm broke.
The hootings rose and filled the air,—but Margaret did not hear them.
Her eye was on the group of lads who had armed themselves with their clogs some time before.
She saw their gesture—she knew its meaning,—she read their aim.
Another moment, and Mr. Thornton might be smitten down,—he whom she had urged and goaded to come to this perilous place.
She only thought how she could save him.
She threw her arms around him; she made her body into a shield from the fierce people beyond.
Still, with his arms folded, he shook her off.
'Go away,' said he, in his deep voice.
'This is no place for you.'
'It is!' said she.
'You did not see what I saw.'